Midgar

DISCLAIMER: I don't own Final Fantasy VII or Titanic. If I did, I would be filthy freakin rich and not writing this.

This fic is VERY AU, a slight parody off of the movie Titanic, with the FFVII crew.

CHAPTER 1: The Heart of the Planet

"Jesus, Mary, and Joseph…" Vincent Valentine stared out his porthole. "Look at her…"

Reno scoffed. "This is the third dive we've made in three days. Can't you think of something else to say? And you're supposed to be shooting your documentary this time,"

Vincent sighed, but pulled the video camera out of its bag and switched it on.

"Welcome aboard the sub Lucrecia. We've located the Midgar, and are now making our third dive down to the ship's watery grave, where she arrived on April 15, 1912, after her long fall from the world above…"

Reno snorted from behind him. "You're so full of shit, boss!"

Vincent laughed slightly, and turned the camera back to the porthole. Out of the darkness of the ocean depths, an enormous prow loomed from nowhere, which gave way to the rusted ruins of a once grand ship. "Here we are as we come up over the bow of the Midgar, the legendary ship that was hailed to be unsinkable. Now, we see only a shadow of what once was," he rapped sharply on the glass with his knuckles. "The pressure down here is over 6000 pounds per cubic inch. These portholes are nine inches thick, and if they go, well, it's sayonara in two microseconds," he switched the camera off. "Okay, let's break out DARP. I've been waiting too damn long for this,"

"Righto," Reno mock-saluted his employer and pulled the visor and control stick into his reach.

Vincent Valentine, famed oceanographer and treasure-hunter, was positively giddy with anticipation. The legendary 'Heart of the Planet' materia gem was finally within his grasp. He pushed the red headband that held back his thick black hair up. He'd spent the past seven years searching for it. Considering he was only 27 at the time, the better half of his adult life had been spent on this single dive. There was no room for error. He'd followed a trail of insurance claims for the rare gem filed by a man named Sephiroth Masamune. And now, they were searching the old bastard's old stateroom for the safe that held it.

The screen relaying what the DARP (Deep Aquatic Reconnaissance Probe) was seeing showed the inside of the once-great ship. DARP was a small remote-controlled robot which was able to go where minisubs couldn't- into wrecks. The robot was equipped with several cameras, tubes for taking samples, and a pair of mechanical arms for lifting obstacles. "Come on, come on…" Vincent whispered.

A deep voice crackled over the radio. "Mr. Valentine, we're not finding anything in Kadaj's stateroom. If the gem's here, then it's in Sephiroth's room,"

"Just keep looking, Rude," Vincent replied calmly, even though his heart was pounding in his chest. "You never know…" DARP passed another stateroom, whose door was caved in. Vincent glanced at the pictures taken from the first dive, and felt his heart leap. "Back it up, Reno, this is it!" Reno quickly obeyed, backing up and swinging around into the room. A loud 'crunch' was heard on the microphones as DARP hit the doorframe, followed by a curse from the red-haired operator. "Why the hell are there six pedals when there are only four directions?" he muttered.

Reno panned the camera around the room, taking in the sights. "So this is where the son of a bitch slept, huh?"

"So it would seem," Vincent replied. He studied the screens carefully. "Hey wait, what's that?"

"What?"

"That, right there on the left!" He pointed to a door lying against a table.

"What is it?"

"The door, you idiot! I wanna see what's under it!"

"Alright, alright," Reno grumbled, but moved closer to the overturned door. "Gimme my hands, man, gimme my hands…" he pulled the two controllers for the robotic arms out, and gingerly grabbed the door with its pincerlike hands.

"Careful, it might come apart," Vincent observed.

"Duly noted," Reno then flipped it over, releasing the door and letting it fall. When the dust had settled, both occupants stared at the aftermath in awe. "Holy fuck, are you seein' this, boss?" Under the door had been a large, cubical object.

On the deck of the research ship Turk, the crew was celebrating. The safe, along with some other artifacts recovered from some other staterooms, were all safely aboard, and now the safe was waiting to be cracked.

"Alright, bust her open, Tseng," The black-haired man obliged, cutting away at the bolt and hinges with a diamond saw. Reno apparently felt the moment needed something, and shook up a bottle of champagne, pouring it out over the cheering crowd. Within seconds, the safe's front was pulled away, spilling its contents out onto the deck, and Vincent rushed in.

His heart was pounding hard in his chest. This was it, the moment he'd been waiting for for the past seven years! He pulled out wad after wad of muddy currency, long ago ruined by the ocean depths. He pulled out a portfolio of some kind, callously tossing it to the side, and searched again through the safe, frantic now. Nothing.

"No diamonds," Tseng said quietly.

"Hey boss," Reno said seriously. "Ya know, the same thing happened to Ghast, and his career never recovered…"

Vincent turned back to the cameras with a pained look. "Turn the damn camera off."

"Look, I'm sure it's down there somewhere, boss, just--"

"We don't have enough time or money for another dive, Elena! It's over!" The argument carried the two of them below deck.

"I'm sure Mr. Jacobs can give us more time! Can't you just please--" she stopped in mid-sentence, pausing to look at one of the archaeologists gently cleaning the sketchbook from earlier, or more importantly, the drawing inside. "Hey, what's that?"

It depicted a beautiful nude woman, her hair flowing freely around her. She was in an elegant, laying-down position, her hands over her head. But more importantly was the white, heart-shaped gem hanging from her neck.

Vincent's jaw dropped. "I'll be God damned."

Aeris worked the sewing needle with practiced precision. She'd been working on this dress for her new great-granddaughter Marlene, and was determined to finish it. The TV was on in the background, some garbage about the latest celebrity breakup. There was a static buzz as her granddaughter next door changed the channel, and then a man was speaking.

"… haven't found what we were looking for yet, but we did manage to recover some items from the wreckage of the Midgar…" Aeris's heart skipped a beat. She reached shakily for her cane, and pulled herself out of the chair.

"Yuffie, dear, turn that up please…" The black-haired girl rushed to her grandmother's aide, and turned the dial up.

The man speaking was tall, wearing a dark red sweatshirt and black jeans. A simple red headband restrained his voluminous black hair. He was gesturing to a tank, where a blonde woman was gently cleaning a muddy book, a sketchbook in fact. No… "Well Linda, I'll just direct your attention to this drawing, which we recovered from a dive just earlier this day. It's fascinating how this piece of paper has been preserved…"

But Aeris Gainsborough was no longer listening, but closely examining the drawing on the screen. It depicted a beautiful nude woman lying on a couch, her dark hair flowing from her head. But what interested Aeris more was the white, heart-shaped gem around her neck. Her jaw dropped. "I'll be God damned!"

Vincent sighed, watching as the minisubs were prepped for launch. By some token of fate, the publicity from the drawing had caused their financier, one mister Raphael Jacobs, to pay for one last dive. Thus, here they were, beginning another dive.

He turned around when someone tapped him on the shoulder. It was Rude. The tall man's usually neatly trimmed goatee had degenerated into a bad case of '5 o' clock shadow', a sure sign that he was tired. "Satellite call for you, sir," he said simply, handing over the phone.

Vincent immediately handed it back. "I'm kinda busy, Rude. Do you not see these submersibles going in the water?"

"Believe me, you want to take this call," Rude said firmly, handing him the phone a second time.

"Fine, fine, who is this guy?"

"She's a woman, actually. Her name's…" he glanced at a piece of paper. "Gainsborough, Aeris Gainsborough, and you might want to speak up; she's kinda old,"

"Wonderful, friggin wonderful…" he put the phone to his ear. "Hello?"

An elderly woman answered. "I was just wondering, Mr. Valentine, if you had found the Heart of the Planet yet," Vincent's eyes widened in shock, and Rude chuckled.

"Told you you wanted to take the call,"

Vincent turned his attention back to the phone. "You have my attention, Mrs. Gainsborough. So, do you know who the woman in the picture is?"

"Well, yes," she answered. "The woman in the picture is me."

"She's a God damn liar!" Reno yelled over the roar of machinery. "She's probably some stupid old biddie looking for publicity, like that Russian chick, Anesthesia!"

"Anastasia," Vincent corrected.

"Whatever!" Reno retorted. "My point is, if this hag is who she says she is, she'd be over a hundred by now!"

"A hundred and one next month," Vincent smiled, and walked up the stairs to the helipad.

"Okay, so she's a very old god damn liar!" He grabbed his boss's shoulder. "Look, we already did a background check on her! The record goes back to the twenties. Her name was Strife back then. So she goes to New York, meets this guy Zack Gainsborough and she punches out a couple of kids. Point is, the record never even mentions the Midgar!"

"Yeah well, the records also say that everybody who's supposed to know about that materia is dead, but she knows!" Vincent shrugged off the hand, and continued up the steps to the helicopter.

There, several employees were unloading what looked to be several tons of luggage (and a goldfish bowl). "Doesn't exactly travel light, does she?" Reno snickered.

Vincent then turned his attention to Rude and a pretty dark-haired girl he didn't recognize, who were helping the elderly Mrs. Gainsborough off the helicopter, who was in a wheelchair. He strode forward, holding out his hand. She took it, and much to his surprise, shook it in a firm grip for her age, and smiled. "I'm Vincent Valentine!" He yelled over the roar of the helicopter blades. "Welcome to the Turk, Miss Aeris!" He motioned to his employees to aid her, and they escorted her to her stateroom.

Vincent opened the door slightly. "Is everything to your satisfaction, ma'am?"

Aeris looked up at him and smiled. She looked every bit the sweet old grandma. "Oh, yes, it's very nice," she placed a picture on her dresser, adding to an already growing collection. "I must have my pictures with me when I travel. Have you met my granddaughter Yuffie? She takes care of me,"

The dark-haired girl from before smiled at him. "Yuffie Kisaragi. We met up on deck. Don't you remember that, Nana?" the woman shook her head, muttering something about memory.

"Well, is there anything that either of you needs?" Vincent asked pointedly.

"Yes," Aeris replied. "I would like to see my drawing."

Inside Vincent's private 'lab' (basically where all artifacts from dives were kept), Vincent led Yuffie, who was pushing Aeris's wheelchair, over to the basin where the drawing was being kept. Aeris stood shakily, peering over the edge. Her aged eyes widened in awe, staring down at the beautiful goddess in the drawing. She closed her eyes, briefly remembering those bright blue eyes watching her, studying her, and creating her on paper.

Vincent pulled a photograph of a white, heart-shaped gem. "Back in 1792, King Louis XIV had a very rare white materia crystal set in his crown. He later had it carved into a heartlike shape, calling it 'La Cour de la Munda' or--"

"The Heart of the Planet," Aeris finished.

"Are you sure this is you, Nana?" Yuffie asked.

"Well, it is me, dear! Wasn't I a dish?" Aeris laughed slightly.

"Anyway," Vincent continued, "the materia disappeared around 1814, around the same time Louis lost everything from the neck up. A few years later, it was picked up by an English noblewoman. Would you have any clue as to who that is?"

Aeris smiled once again. "I should imagine someone named Masamune,"

"That's right, Jenova Masamune. Anyway, she gave it to her son, whose name was…" he trailed off.

"Sephiroth," She spat, uttering the name with an unnatural amount of contempt.

Vincent was now positively giddy. "And you see this?" He pointed to the date on the bottom of the paper. "April 14, 1912,"

"Which means," Reno interrupted, "that if your grandma is who she says she is, then she was wearing the materia ON the night of the sinking."

Vincent grinned. "And that makes you my new best friend." He gestured to the table behind him. "These are some items we recovered from your stateroom."

The old woman walked slowly to the table, picking up a polished silver mirror, and gasped. "This was mine! Why, it looks the same as when I saw it last!" She turned it over, gazing into the reflection. Her skin had wrinkled with the passage of time, and pale liver spots dotted her face. "The reflection's changed a bit," she observed dryly. She picked up a large ornate butterfly hair ornament. "How extraordinary!" Without warning, a tear came to her eye, and she drew a deep shuddering breath.

"Are you ready to go back to the Midgar?" Vincent asked softly. Aeris nodded slowly.

Reno had now set up a short 3D detailing the sinking of the Midgar, and was now going into a rather strongly worded reenactment of it. "So anyways, she comes along and hits the berg, punching holes in the side like Morse Code, dit-dit-dit, filling the first five compartments with water. Now, the compartments aren't airtight and they only go up to E Deck, so they start filling up one after another, which causes the bow to dip down, slowly at first, then faster and faster until finally she's got her whole ass stickin' up in the air! And I mean, that's a big ass! I mean, bigger than Rosie O' Donnel, we're talkin' twenty, thirty thousand tons!" Everyone in the room laughed at the reference. "Now the hull's not designed to deal with that kind of pressure, so what happens? KRRRRRRRKKK! She splits, right down to the keel!" The ship on screen broke in half in perfect time with Reno's words. "So the weight of the bow pulls the stern vertical, before finally detaching and sinking. The stern section sort of bobs there like a cork for a minute or so, floods, and then finally goes under at about 2:30 AM on April 15, about 2 hours and 45 minutes after the collision. Now the bow planes away. It's goin' probably ten or twelve knots when it hits the ocean floor like a god damn jackhammer. "POOM! PLCCCCCGGGG!" Once again, he was perfectly synchronized with the video. "Pretty sweet, huh?" You could have heard a pin drop, so awkwardly silent was the room then.

"Just sit down, Reno," Vincent said exasperatedly. Yuffie suppressed a snort.

"Thank you for that… interesting take on things, Mr. Reno," Aeris said quietly. "It was very nice, but the experience was… somewhat different," The room immediately quieted.

"Are you ready to go back to the Midgar, Aeris?" Vincent said softly, placing a hand on her shoulder.

She turned with a pained look to the video screen. It displayed rusted-over ornate iron doors, which lead into the ballroom. In her mind's eye, she could hear the music playing from the string quartet, see the doors opened by members of the crew, welcoming her in. The memory was too much for her, and she burst into tears.

Yuffie immediately rushed to her grandmother's aid. "Come on Nana, let's go rest,"

"No…" Aeris sniffed.

"I'm very sorry about this, Mr. Valentine; she's had a long day, and--"

"No!" Aeris said firmly, and Yuffie sat down quietly. "It's been… 84 years…"

"It's okay," Vincent muttered soothingly. He elbowed Reno in the gut, who produced a tape recorder. "Just try to remember, Mrs. Gainsborough, anything at all,"

"Do you want to hear this or not, Mr. Valentine?" Aeris said coolly. Yuffie made a cough that sounded suspiciously like 'burn…'. "It's been… 84 years, and I can still smell the fresh paint… The china had never been used… The sheets had never been slept in… Midgar was called 'The ship of dreams'… And it was… It really was…"